Imagine writing an email knowing the recipient could see every draft as you typed it. Every typo, every awkward sentence, every idea you abandoned before finding the right words. How would that feel?
Imagine sending a text message, but the other person could see every version before the final one. Not just what you chose to send, but all the thoughts you decided were better left unsaid.
Imagine learning a skill where people judged you based on your first attempt instead of the finished result. Every mistake became part of the evaluation instead of part of the learning process.
That is what Figma's current model feels like. It exposes the process instead of focusing on the outcome.
Design is iterative by nature. Ideas are explored, tested, discarded, revisited, and refined. The rough work is not the product. It is simply how the product gets made.
In almost every profession, people are judged on what they choose to present, not every imperfect step they took to get there. When the entire creative process becomes visible, experimentation starts to feel risky. People become more concerned with how they appear than with solving the problem in front of them.
For me, I spend my days in an environment where paying clients can watch my work unfold in real time. They see unfinished thoughts, partial solutions, and ideas that are still being worked through. It is not uncommon to receive a Slack or Teams messages halfway through a design exploration asking why I am making a particular decision, or being told that something is the wrong direction before I have even had the chance to develop it.
It is incredibly disruptive. It breaks concentration, interrupts the creative process, and replaces exploration with constant self-consciousness. Every idea feels like it is being evaluated before it has had a chance to become anything.
Creative work needs space to be messy. It needs room for bad ideas, dead ends, and half-formed thoughts. That is not a flaw in the process. It is the process.
Without that space, you do not get better collaboration. You get safer thinking, less experimentation, and ultimately worse work.
What wears on me most is that I have to return to that environment every day. Eight to Twelve hours of working while feeling observed, interrupted, and judged in the middle of the process. Over time, that does not just affect the quality of the work. It affects the person doing it.
